Breeding a meat hen with a RIR roo?!

[The-White-Elephant]

Big Boy was 15lbs, & 24 inches tall when standing fully.

Big Boy's, Brother was a bit lighter, between 12 ½, to 13lbs. He was a bit shorter too.

The pullets were almost the same size of the cockerels, & weighed about 9 ½ - 10lbs. Smallest was around 8lb - 7lbs.

Not a new breed, but was actually planning on using Big Boy for a new Breed project. But some careless person wrung his neck.

So sorry for him. But wow! They’re just as big as JG

 

[MysteryChicken]

So sorry for him. But wow! They’re just as big as JG

But we're abit faster growing then the JGs.

 

[The-White-Elephant]

But we're abit faster growing then the JGs.

Yeah, they take a long time to grow. But I’m glad that yours turned out!

 

[Ridgerunner]

Hi. Welcome to the forum from Louisiana, glad you joined us.

Has anyone tried this?

I personally have not tried a cross with McMurray's Big Red Broilers or Rangers in general. I'm not sure if those are comparable to Rangers or not.

I would love to find out what mix the broilers are to do more in depth genetic research, but I'm sure it's a carefully guarded secret.

McMurray is not very forthcoming on what they cross to get those birds. They are obviously not sex links because both the boys and girls are red. In the Q&A they say they are not good for reproduction because they are hybrids, but they don't say why. I know hybrids don't breed true but what part of the recessive genetics would cause a problem? It may be important to what you want to do, it may not.

opinions, and perspectives

If you breed a hybrid you don't get consistent results, whether it is bred to another hybrid or a pure bred chicken. Without knowing what the differences are in their parents you don't know what those inconsistent results might be. It could be something like comb type, eye color, or many other things that wouldn't bother you. But it could be something like final size, growth rate, skin color, egg laying, or something that might be very important to you.

In my opinion if you breed that RIR rooster over the BRB pullet you will get some that you are really happy with and some you are not. The more you hatch the better your chances of getting some good ones. If you breed the best of the ones you'd like to eat and eat the rest, in a few generations you will be hatching mostly chicks you are pretty happy with. That first generation you might get a lot that are not great but that number should go down each generation.

If you are into this for the long haul, this probably isn't a horrible way to start. If you are only interested in the next generation, you are probably not going to be real happy. All this is speculation because we don't know the genetics.

 

[Smileybans]

I don’t know anything about genetics, so I could be wrong here, but isn’t the Sagitta the same thing? It’s a cross between a RIR and a Cornish cross… is that different? I really don’t know.

 

[baillywagner87]

I've never crossed a Broiler to another breed. I only do Heritage, or Heritage type chickens, & make crosses from them for meat.

Thank you! Is there a particular breed in your opinion that would be an ideal cross with our RIR roo for a heritage meat cross?

 

[Morrigan]

I've not crossed McMurray reds before, but I have crossed a heritage rooster (Naked Neck) to other slow broiler hens -- Moyer's reds, a Red Ranger hen out of an Idaho hatchery and a slow white broiler from the feed store.

I've been pleased with the results. The offspring are a bit slower to grow out and a bit smaller than the true broiler stock, but much bigger and faster than my attempts to breed heritage on heritage. I typically got 4 to 5+ pound birds after 13 weeks from my hertiage/broiler rooster crosses. I waited a bit longer to process the hens, but got similar weights and tasty, tender hens at around 18 to 24 weeks. Overall, I found it an easy, and more enjoyable alternative to constantly ordering meat birds from the hatcheries.

 

[Torinik]

Alright, everyone... I want to find out if anyone has tried this (Was it a great idea? Was it a terrible idea? Is it worth a shot?):

It's not a direct answer to your question, but what I have done is breed a white broiler (CX) to a brown layer hybrid.
I was on F3 last season and have some real beasts walking around now. The small ones and slow growers were culled and eaten.

You can expect to see some very varied outcome. Just in feather color the offspring of those 2 has ranged from black to white and pretty much everything in between. I've had one with the weirdest grayish-blueish combination I have ever seen, not even mentioning the eyes of that one. And another dark grey/light brown combination and sort of golden laced. Very beautiful chickens to look at, but especially the first one had a very nervous character.
I've had very small and narrow chickens and big ones that are still here and turned out to be good to very good layers. Differences in sizes and growing speeds have been extreme in these first three generations.

So, it goes all over the place. I think you can expect the same with a meat hen and a RIR.

I'm hoping to get more consistency next season with the F4, especially with size and growing speed because that's basically the only thing I'm selecting on for now.

I'd say it's definitely worth a shot. If shoot you might miss, but if you don't shoot you will most certainly not hit anything.

 

[MysteryChicken]

Thank you! Is there a particular breed in your opinion that would be an ideal cross with our RIR roo for a heritage meat cross?

If you have a Brahma, it would be a good experiment.

 

[NatJ]

If you breed a hybrid you don't get consistent results, whether it is bred to another hybrid or a pure bred chicken. Without knowing what the differences are in their parents you don't know what those inconsistent results might be. It could be something like comb type, eye color, or many other things that wouldn't bother you. But it could be something like final size, growth rate, skin color, egg laying, or something that might be very important to you.

You can predict some of those things, just by what genes are recessive.

Single comb is recessive, so breeding two chickens with single comb should give only single comb offspring.

But I agree with the basic point, that there will be variations, and they might be areas that matter or they might be in areas that do not matter for your purpose.